Pat O’Brien, the disgraced ex-anchor of “The Insider,” is returning from his fall from grace. The former CBS sportscaster and “Access Hollywood” co-host will combine the lessons learned from his years in TV and his struggle with alcoholism in an upcoming tell-all with biographer Andrew Morton.
He’ll also address, albeit briefly, his divorce in 2004 from wife Linda, and “my unfortunate scandal.”
In 2005, when O’Brien was at “The Insider,” he left slurred voicemails, leaked to the Internet, asking a woman to join him for drugs and sex. In one, he suggested a threesome with his girlfriend, Betsy, whom he subsequently married.
He entered rehab and returned to “The Insider,” but was fired in 2008 after he sent an e-mail to colleagues that insulted co-host Lara Spencer, saying that her segments made viewers “want to vomit.”
“I was not in total recovery at the time. I was still messed up,” O’Brien explained to Page Six. Although he calls “Access Hollywood” the best entertainment show on television, he told us “The Insider” producers were more concerned about titillating headlines than Hollywood news.
“Instead of interviewing, for example, Reneé Zellweger on her movie, [the show] instructed me to ask her if she’s ever been depressed. Then she’ll say no, and the show goes on and says, ‘Was Reneé Zellweger depressed?’ Of course the answer is no.”
“They would demand at the end of the day that I ask [a guest] about anorexia, depression, suicide . . . to get that headline.”
An “Insider” spokesperson responded, “Pat has an interesting memory of his time at ‘The Insider.’ Our production team does a quality show, and the work speaks for itself.”
Since leaving “The Insider,” Pat’s been sober for more than 600 days and has filled in as host of “The Don Imus Show.” Plus, he’s mulling a multiyear radio deal.
O’Brien’s memoir, tentatively titled “I Love Your Work,” will be published next fall by St. Martin’s Press.